TUTORIAL: How to get Ubuntu on the TouchPad

[threezero]

Help I'm trying to put ubuntu on my touchpad now

I'm stuck at the part where i guess you partition the tp with the 2gb partition for the ubuntu. I created the custom webos build. THe problem is when i attempt to run this custom build. I'm stuck at 12% every single time. I try putting it in to usb mode I try the 12 % solution posted here
forums.precentral.net/hp-touchpad/307202-webos-doctor-stuck-12-solution-fix.html
and i only got invalid file directory on novaterm.

plz help i know the tp is not brick but right now i can't go into android or into webos at all if i force it off than back on it will point me to w w w palm com/rom

please help@@@!!!!

EDIT: i'm a using a mac btw not that it makes a difference... seems like all the files and stuff isn't os dependant

2nd EDIT: when i force it off and turn it back on again i can see the linux logo for a split second does this mean anything?

3nd EDIT:
here's snippet of the code right before it say "we are unable to reset your device"

Dec 3, 2011 7:18:48 PM com.palm.nova.installer.recoverytool.CardController handleFailCase
INFO: something failed, query to see if device is plugged in
Dec 3, 2011 7:18:48 PM com.palm.nova.installer.recoverytool.CardController handleFailCase
INFO: exiting handleFailCase()
Trenchcoat error: <ERROR> CPU-specific initialization failed
at com.palm.nova.installer.core.stages.TrenchcoatStage.run(TrenchcoatStage.java:104)
at com.palm.nova.installer.core.FlasherThread.run(FlasherThread.java:472)
at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:680)
Dec 3, 2011 7:18:49 PM com.palm.nova.installer.recoverytool.runner.DeviceDiscoveryRunner$DeviceDiscoveryThread run
INFO: got controller
Dec 3, 2011 7:18:49 PM com.palm.nova.installer.recoverytool.runner.DeviceDiscoveryRunner$DeviceDiscoveryThread run
INFO: got devices 1
Dec 3, 2011 7:18:49 PM com.palm.nova.installer.recoverytool.CardController runnerFinished
INFO: device runner done
Dec 3, 2011 7:18:49 PM com.palm.nova.installer.recoverytool.CardController runnerFinished
WARNING: flashing failed, move to failed card

[jdm8000]

Try resetting with stock WebOS Doctor. That should get WebOS working again.
For installing Ubuntu, you could try partitioning manually with novaterm.

[threezero]

Originally Posted by jdm8000

Try resetting with stock WebOS Doctor. That should get WebOS working again.
For installing Ubuntu, you could try partitioning manually with novaterm.

thanks going to try that. for the record should i do ubuntu first and than do android or does it really matter? luckily i don't really have anything critical saved on the tp

[jdm8000]

I don't think it matters which one you install first.

After you doctor your TP, Android might still be installed and you'll just have to reinstall moboot, but I don't know for sure. One way you could check is after you doctor your tp, download filemgr and Internalz Pro, and navigate to /dev/store. If you see cm-system, cm-data, and cm-cache, then Android is probably still installed. If not, you'll have to reinstall it.

I installed Ubuntu first (Only because I had it before the Android install was released), but it shouldn't matter.

[techlover10]

I don't quite want to install Ubuntu on my touchpad yet because I am still under warranty and don't want to void it, also I have had some bad experiences with Linux in the past. However, there is one program which I would want to use on the touchpad. I sometimes write music scores in my spare time and I use MuseScore to do this. MuseScore is a free crossplatform music scoring software. If anyone with a touchpad running Ubuntu would like to test this software for me, or if you already use this on your touchpad, please let me know the results; I would love to be able to edit scores on the go.

[bluenote]

Originally Posted by techlover10

I don't quite want to install Ubuntu on my touchpad yet because I am still under warranty and don't want to void it, also I have had some bad experiences with Linux in the past. However, there is one program which I would want to use on the touchpad. I sometimes write music scores in my spare time and I use MuseScore to do this. MuseScore is a free crossplatform music scoring software. If anyone with a touchpad running Ubuntu would like to test this software for me, or if you already use this on your touchpad, please let me know the results; I would love to be able to edit scores on the go.

I was able to download and create a score but not hear it. I spent a few minutes trying to troubleshoot that issue but not much--it looks like a project.

[techlover10]

Originally Posted by bluenote

I was able to download and create a score but not hear it. I spent a few minutes trying to troubleshoot that issue but not much--it looks like a project.

Thanks! That question had been in the back of my mind for a long time now. Also, how easy is it to use?

[bluenote]

Originally Posted by techlover10

Thanks! That question had been in the back of my mind for a long time now. Also, how easy is it to use?

I touched the notes with my finger and then touched the score and they appeared. Also keyboard seems to work. I just spent a minute or two in notes view, putting notes down on the page, I did not test every feature as I am not familiar with the program. You should consult with the Linux experts as to how to enable sound. I tried to press preferences but the program closed.

[techlover10]

Originally Posted by bluenote

I touched the notes with my finger and then touched the score and they appeared. Also keyboard seems to work. I just spent a minute or two in notes view, putting notes down on the page, I did not test every feature as I am not familiar with the program. You should consult with the Linux experts as to how to enable sound. I tried to press preferences but the program closed.

That sounds easier than using the program on desktops...lol...I am not really a member of the linux community, though; I have had several bad experiences with it in the past. However, I know that the MuseScore community has many people who would love to be able to use MuseScore on a tablet. I am not a Linux expert, but if anyone know someone who knows Linux and would be willing to volunteer for this, it could be a great project. Also...if anyone wants to port it to WebOS...even better

[techlover10]

I was thinking about homebrew-ing my TP (I haven't yet because I don't want to mess with the system until I know more), but I know that there is the whole dual-boot Ubuntu system which goes farther than homebrew. Is it possible to just get the Ubuntu Chroot app/thing in my TP without doing the partitioning and dualboot setup? I'd like to be able to get Ubuntu apps on my TP but I don't really need the whole window manager setup.

[baastien]

Hi all,

After installing Ubuntu on my TP, I was not really convinced. In order to find again my clean TP, I've ran WebOS Doctor.

Unfortunately, now I can't type the & character. In azerty keyboard, all other characters in a long press on 1 appears, except &. What happend instead is that cursor goes in the beggining on the text area. In a qwerty keyboard configuration, it is also impossible for my to get & character, same action of the cursor.

I think I had to remap the keys especially the return code of & character, but how ? Does anyone have any ideas to help me solve this matter, please ?
Thank you

[AZOTh999]

Originally Posted by geekpeter

export GTK_MODULES=libgtkstylus.so

this part above is done before your desktop environment is even started, basically add it to any startup script you have or type it before launching LXDE/Whatever you use.

then as mentioned in the previous relevant post, just hold your screen and rightmouse will function (requires holding till released) and if you move around too much it wont work.

after doing this i have changed my custom keymap for rightmouse via keyboard, to now emulate the escape key instead.

Redefining the ` as escape is brilliant. Without that or something similar, editing in vim is impossible.
Mind sharing what you defined that as?

[k4ever]

Well I just spent the last day and a half playing with Ubuntu Chroot on my TouchPad. Here is what I've done so far:

Used a (self) modified 4GBPartion.sh script from here to easily create my partition:

Installation - hp-touchpad-ubuntu - Ubuntu for the HP TouchPad - Google Project Hosting --- Note: I removed lines 3-18 from mine

Then I installed Xecutah/XServer/Xterm/UbuntuChroot from Preware

Then I used the easy autoconfig file from here to install Ubuntu on the partition:

Easy Autoconfiguration for Ubuntu

I chose xfce4 and onboard. The script worked great and I had a working xfce4 desktop.

Then I updated Ubuntu to 12.04 from a terminal by running:

sudo do-release-upgrade

I ran into some trouble with a few things, the update was smooth but not exactly clean.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

What I have learned so far is that although xfce4 is a clean looking desktop and works well, keyboard support in it is hit and miss. The TouchPad's default keyboard and HP's bluetooth keyboard would not work correctly with it no matter what I set the keyboard layout to. Onboard was kinda iffy also. I installed LXDE which worked great with every keyboard I threw at it, but it would not shutdown correctly. Even doing a ctrl-c on the open terminal window wouldn't give reliable results. So I switch to e17.

E17 works well. It crashes on first startup everytime, but it gives you the option to recover. Wait about 5 seconds before hitting the recover button and you are presented with a good looking desktop. I didn't like the way Illum (tablet oriented e17 desktop) looked, so I keep the default desktop. I set scaling to 2.00x so everything looked big enough on the TouchPad. I even configured LXDE's file manager (pcmanfm) to be my application launcher for e17 (used the GNOME foot icon for the launcher).

I also installed some themes from here:

8 Beautiful Themes For Enlightenment WM | LinuxHaxor.net -- I settled on the "Simpy-White" theme

I used lxappearance to control the look and feel of gtk applications (Chrome, Mozilla, Synaptic, etc) for my e17 desktop.

After spending all that time I have a great Ubuntu desktop with everything working pretty good. I did notice some issues:

The official Flash plugin doesn't work well or at all with Chrome and Firefox. Gnash works alright but there are some Flash elements that don't work with it (youtube works great!).

Sound works fine when it is working. However if there is a sound problem, I have to totally restart my TouchPad to get it to work again.

VLC doesn't work well. Totem seems to do better.

You have to let mp3 files play all the way through of completely stop one before attempting to play another one. You can jump from one to another without having an issue. Doesn't matter which media player you use (I like Miro).

As mentioned before, if you are going to use enlightenment (e17), it is going to give you an error each time you start it for the first time after starting chroot. You need to wait at least 5 seconds before recovering from the error. If you don't e17 will think you have a module/plugin causing the issue, then suspend all of you modules/plugins and make you select each one again (it's a fail safe measure).

XPDF likes to crash on just about every pdf file. Use Evince instead.

Angry Birds causes Chrome to crash everytime (bummer!!).

I attached some screenshots of my LXDE desktop and my e17 desktop. I want to thank everyone who worked on this project.

[k4ever]

Question: Can we not run display managers in chroot?

I spent the whole day trying to get gdm, kdm, lxdm, and lightdm to work with no luck. Then it dawned on me that I might not be able to do it since this is a chroot, but I figured I would ask.

[achimi]

Originally Posted by rwhitby

The Wiki pages have guides on how to install, and how to remove.

Why does nobody read the Wiki pages we write when we create these things for you?

-- Rod

Hi Rod and all the other gurus here,

i have read the wiki, but i made sth bad, so the resizing of my userspace doesn´t work:

I ve used the Ubuntu chroot for some time, but my main purpose to install it was to have the ability to print from Ubuntu to my network-connected Brother inkPrinter.
But i couldn´t get this to work, because of the lack of Printerdrivers. The ARM Version of CUPS etc. didn´t include the necessary Driver.

I am printing sometimes now using the Printing ability of Dropbox, which works with Printers connected to a Windows or Linux-box.

So i have no further need for Ubuntu and would like to try out CM9 or CM10 again on my TP.

So, because i have/had a installation of Ubuntu-chroot., i created a metadoctor for this project.

First i uninstalled all the Things like Xecutah, Xterm....., Ubuntu chroot etc. using preware.

Then i followed the Wiki like it is described here:

How to remove the ext3fs partition

Connect your webOS device to your PC

------- started VB-Ubuntu 11.04 with all things needed installed, then connected TP with USB-Cable to PC

Open up Terminal (Mac/ Linux) or Command Prompt (Windows), then type "novaterm"

------- Started an got the novaterm prompt

And after you presented by your webOS device's root shell, run this command:

Unmount EXT3FS partition:

# umount /dev/mapper/store-ext3fs

------- succesfully executed

Remove EXT3FS partition:

# lvremove /dev/mapper/store-ext3fs

------- succesfully executed

Then run meta-doctor to re-assign all space to user's diskspace

--------- at this point, i think i made the big mistake:
i couldnt understand how to make this an decided to enter the step........


Or, if you already do Meta-Doctor first, you can follow these steps:

------- i didnt understand the meaning an entered the next step, i am an *****, i know, but i did it

Connect your webOS device to your PC
Open up Terminal (Mac/ Linux) or Command Prompt (Windows), then type "novaterm"
And after you presented by your webOS device's root shell, run this command:

------- succesfully executed

Display LV size of EXT3FS partition, don't forget to write that down:

# lvdisplay /dev/mapper/store-ext3fs

------- succesfully executed but !!!!!! forgot to write down the LV Size of ext3fs partition !!!!!!

Remove EXT3FS partition:

# lvremove /dev/mapper/store-ext3fs

------- succesfully executed

Display existing user diskspace partition:

# df -kh

------- succesfully executed

image of df-kh

Unmount existing user diskspace partition:

# umount /dev/mapper/store-media

------- succesfully executed


Resize existing user diskspace by adding size of previous EXT3FS partition:

I'm using /etc/fstab to see the filesystem of user's diskspace and /proc/partitions to see total allocation for user's diskspace:

image of cat /etc/fstab

image of cat /etc/proc/partitions

# resizefat /dev/mapper/store-media 6995968K

------- because i forgot to write down the size, i copied the above to my terminal and executed it and got an Error message from the process, which looked like this:

dosfsck 2.11, 12 Mar 2005, FAT32, LFN
/dev/mapper/store-media: 115891 files, 237455/348585 clusters
Unable to resize filesystem. Minimum size 15440602 sectors, 13991936 requested.

I dont know, what to do with this message !

Shame on me, i cannot recall the size of the Ext3fs choosed for the creating of the metadoctor, nor can i find inside the Metadoctor file any hint, where i have to look to find it. But i think i have chosen the standard 2GB.

So for this time i ended up here, because of lack of knowledge, how to do further things with metadoctor.

And now, i ask you all for help to get back to my whole Userspace.

Maybe there is somebody out there in the wild, who knows to help a DAU

Cheers

Achim from germany

[rwhitby]

Use Tailor from the beta feed.

-- Rod

[achimi]

Originally Posted by rwhitby

Use Tailor from the beta feed.

-- Rod

Thanks Rod,

your my "live"-saver. After activating the beta-feeds in Preware, this resizing with tailor was then the easiest thing ever.

Thanks for this intuitive app. No Problem to understand what it does.

Cheers

Achim from germany

[kayphoonstar]

Originally Posted by k4ever

Then I updated Ubuntu to 12.04 from a terminal by running:

sudo do-release-upgrade

I ran into some trouble with a few things, the update was smooth but not exactly clean.

Just curious what kind of trouble you ran into?

I had some really wierd issues but finally got it cleaned up. On one TP, I had no problem at all with the UI but the other one had all sorts of dbus and python errors and I had to go back and start from scratch.

But thanks for pointing out that it can be done!

[grasshoper]

Hey, I got ubuntu in triple boot and like to have full resources that lack in simple card view (but X in card is just awesome I must say!). I have an issue with WiFi though, that I know others encounter also, but I couldn't find the answer.

So when on ubuntu, my WiFi work something like 10 minutes and then internet connection is no more available. The WiFi icon is still on and shows a full connection though, but it just won't work anymore.

Please tell me someone has found a workaround!

[JBuchanan8829]

Hey all,

I am having a problem that I am thinking that maybe someone has encountered. I have gone through all of the steps: install java, install the palm software, install meta-doctor, change the makefile, create the custom build with the partition in mind, installed the buid in the touchpad, verified that the build worked, install novaterm and sdk, created the directory on the touchpad through novaterm, and did the last few steps. Well, entering the final stages, I go to install Ubuntu and I get an IPKG error. Can someone help me with this.

Thank you